Summit Keynote Jimmy Jam:
“Music sells everything but itself. Credits help music to sell itself.”
24 November 2020 –DDEX, the international standards-setting organization for the music industry, held its 36th Plenary Meeting and 2nd Creator Credit Summit over the course of two weeks in November, the first time the organization has conducted these as virtual events. During the Plenary sessions, repeated twice each day on 9, 11, and 13 November to accommodate global time zones, members heard reports on the organization’s seven working groups’ activities, and determined the key action items going forward. The Creator Credit Summit, featuring over 30 speakers including composers, producers, engineers; representatives from record labels, distributors, international rights organizations, and more, was a free event held 17-19 November, and open to all to encourage the participation from more of the people “behind the music” such as songwriters, performers, producers, engineers, mixers, and backing musicians that are the ultimate beneficiaries of correct song credits, but often feel left on the sidelines.
“Like so many events, our Spring Plenary meeting was cancelled, and we struggled with how we could best bring all of 110 member organizations together safely, while knowing we would need to modify our usual intense week of meetings into something more manageable for the online-only format. By combining pre-recorded reports with live Q&A, we were able to repeat the sessions to accommodate representative from APAC to LA, while also maintaining the community feel our Plenary meetings are known for,” noted DDEX Secretariat Mark Isherwood. “There was even a spontaneous social event at the end, which goes to show how well our members work together, a year after our last in-person meeting in Stockholm.”
Despite not having met in person for over a year, DDEX was able to publish seven brand new standards in 2020, and another ten or so updates of existing standards for implementation. Highlights from the working group reports included new standard proposals related to Party and Location data, ideas for promoting implementation, streamlining terminology between standards, glossary, and knowledge base updates; as well as updates from CISAC on the new ISWC system, and collaboration with the film standard organization EIDR. In particular, there was an in-depth discussion on reviewing the language of the DDEX standard terminology for potentially insensitive references, and also creating a more nuanced flagging system that includes racist or sexist content. This will be brought forward to the DDEX Board for further action.
“In addition to the member Plenary, it was critically important to us to offer the Creator Credit Summit again, after we held the first as a small, invitation-only event last November in Stockholm,” added Isherwood. “The online format allowed us to have a much larger attendance – well over 200 people signed on each day – and have a broader array of speakers than we may have in a single physical location. Given that we want to reach the widest possible number of music creators to demystify this world of credits and standards, this was an ideal outcome.”
The Creator Credit Summit began with a keynote talk from musical visionary Jimmy Jam, who with his partner Terry Lewis is one of the most influential and successful songwriting and production duos of the past four decades, in conversation with Maureen Droney, Sr. Managing Director for the Recording Academy Producers & Engineers Wing. Their conversation explored the processes a music producer, songwriter, and musician goes through to ensure that their creative work is properly attributed, and why that knowledge has been so important during Jam’s career in the music industry. As he said, “Music sells everything but itself. Credits help music to sell itself.”
For two hours a day over three days, the program was a mix of informative panels and presentations addressing different aspects of creator credits and tools to assist in their proper use, such as proper identification and payment; the conundrum of entering credits in the recording process; DIY musicians and metadata; and music metadata in audio/visual works. The four panels included an impressive array of speakers from across the industry, with a focus on the creators:
How credits improve contributor identification and payment
- Dae Bogan – The Mechanical Licensing Collective
- Adam Gorgoni – Composer
- Sara Jackson – Kobalt Music Group
- Ali Lieberman – SoundExchange
- Moderator: Tony Brooke – Warner Music Group
Entering credits in the recording process: Whose job is it anyway?
- Cameron Craig – Producer/Mixer/Engineer
- Sylvia Massy – Record Producer
- Jr. Regisford – New Heights/New Heat Entertainment
- Craig Rosen – Atlantic Records
- Moderator: Maureen Droney – The Recording Academy
DIY musicians and the metadata miasma
- David Amsel – Soundrop
- Travid Atreo – Producer/Artist
- Brett Chance – DistroKid
- Moderator: MJ Herlihy – CDBaby
Music and audio-visual production – a different spin on metadata
- Michael Lehmann Boddicker – Composer
- Nick Osztreicher – Netflix
- Helena Segersten – Sacem
- Mark Vermaat – Soundmouse
- Moderator: Matt Phipps-Taylor – Phonographic Performance Limited
Seven companies – Creative Passport, Jammber, Muso.ai, Quansic, Session, Sound Credit, and VEVA Sound – gave presentations about the tools they have developed for creators incorporating the DDEX Recording Information Notification Standard (RIN). The event concluded with a lively open discussion with all the participants.
Select panels from the Creator Credit Summit will be available to stream from https://ddex.net/resources-press. The 37th Plenary meeting is planned to be another virtual event the week of 19 April 2021, and the 38th is hoped to be a hybrid in-person and online event the week of 8 November 2021. Given its repeat success, it is expected DDEX will host a third Creator Credit Summit next year as well.
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About DDEX
Formed in 2006, DDEX is an international standards-setting organization made up of leading media companies, music licensing organizations, digital service providers, and technical intermediaries that is dedicated to improving the exchange of data and information across the music industry. To support the automated exchange of information along the digital value chain, DDEX has standardized the format in which information is represented in messages and the method by which the messages are exchanged between business partners. These standards help rights holders, retailers, and technical intermediaries to more effectively communicate information along the digital supply chain. This leads to efficient business transactions, reduced costs, and increased revenues for all sectors involved. DDEX standards are developed and made available for industry-wide implementation. For more information, visit www.ddex.net.
The DDEX Standards
There are eight families of DDEX standards: Release Delivery, Media Enrichment and Description, Sales and Usage Reporting, Claim Detail Message Suite, Works Notification and Licensing, Recording Data and Rights, Collection of Studio Metadata and Linking Works and Recordings. The use of standard message formatting speeds up the exchange of information and increases the accuracy of data, improving efficiency along the digital value chain and streamlining content availability through digital service providers to consumers. All the major digital players — including digital retailers, digital distributors and aggregators, record companies, music licensing companies, music publishers, musical work rights societies, and various technical service providers — use DDEX standards with over 5,000 implementation licenses issued and growing daily. While anyone can implement a standard, only DDEX members can be part of the standard development process – more information on membership online here.